SHEILA GUNN REID ｜ Can bartering help social-credit proof your finances？
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
195.90106
Summary
John Porter, CEO of BarterPay, joins me on The Gunn Show to talk about his company, Barter Pay, and how it s revolutionizing the way we do business. In this episode, we talk about how Barterpay has been around for a while, why it s so unique, and what it s all about.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
What's old is new again, including commerce, bartering for goods and services.
00:00:04.840
I'm Sheila Gunn-Reed, and you're watching The Gunn Show.
00:00:24.220
You know, over the course of the last two and a half years,
00:00:26.800
a lot of people are discovering or rediscovering the old ways,
00:00:34.220
I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that the systems and institutions
00:00:38.940
people thought they could trust and rely upon broke down with very, very little pressure or strain.
00:00:47.420
People took up baking and gardening and foraging for their own food and preserving their food
00:00:52.660
and even hunting because they were worried about supply chain issues.
00:01:00.520
I think people are starting to rethink their relationships with their communities
00:01:03.540
and their neighbors and realizing that those connections should probably be a lot stronger
00:01:09.100
and our connections and trust in our institutions should probably be a little bit more decentralized.
00:01:16.220
Which is why I was so interested to learn about this parallel financial system right under our noses.
00:01:23.120
It's been there for a while, built by John Porter at Barter Pay.
00:01:32.960
But the pandemic has locked a lot of people's assets and services
00:01:41.400
Businesses had a lot of money tied up in assets that they couldn't use,
00:01:48.500
So along comes this parallel system, Barter Pay, to sort of unlock all of that.
00:01:53.820
Although Barter Pay has been around for much longer than the pandemic.
00:01:58.920
It was there, poised, at the right time to help businesses.
00:02:03.880
And now Barter Pay is rolling that business-to-business connection out to the people.
00:02:09.380
Given that a lot of people have a healthy distrust in their own financial institutions these days,
00:02:15.420
as many Canadians are now worried that their political opinions
00:02:18.560
might disconnect them from their financial assets.
00:02:22.260
I think bartering is a wonderful way to make sure that people can still get the things that they need
00:02:27.080
without subjecting themselves to a bankster political litmus test.
00:02:34.440
and let's hear from John Porter of Barter Pay in an interview we recorded earlier Wednesday morning.
00:02:46.900
So joining me now is John Porter from Barter Pay.
00:02:54.880
but I find it fascinating that your business has really done something special
00:03:01.300
in that you address these, for lack of a better term,
00:03:05.180
stranded assets that so many businesses were left with during the pandemic because of shutdown.
00:03:11.200
So businesses with cash flow problems were really able to address that problem
00:03:19.200
But before we get into that, tell us what Barter Pay is all about.
00:03:23.660
And maybe even a little bit about yourself, how you sort of turned back the clock on commerce.
00:03:34.080
It's the Barter Pay, the oldest, newest way of doing business.
00:03:36.880
So yeah, I mean, I was heading to Waterloo University for Engineering back in 1996
00:03:42.500
and took a little bit of a left turn and got involved with some sales and marketing
00:03:50.000
and met somebody who was sort of starting this barter company in Toronto.
00:03:56.140
And long story short, they hosted a convention.
00:03:58.680
There was a couple of people there that were wanting to launch a business in Canada,
00:04:03.400
And so I just came on board and got involved with that brand.
00:04:08.680
And then in 2017, I actually bartered my way to a meeting with Gary Vaynerchuk in New York
00:04:14.360
and came back from that, you know, got a lot of social media coverage off of that,
00:04:19.360
but came back from that and then really launched Barter Pay in 2018.
00:04:23.060
So we've been in the barter payment space for over a quarter century,
00:04:29.640
You know, back then business owners weren't ready.
00:04:33.020
You know, nobody was thinking about alternate forms of payment, that sort of thing.
00:04:36.040
And so we just stuck with it long enough and along the way, my wife and I just celebrated
00:04:39.700
26 years married, but we've had four boys, you know, age almost 16 to 23.
00:04:45.440
So building an unconventional business in a time where really nobody understands it or
00:04:51.720
And then obviously growing a bigger family of busy boys was an interesting time.
00:04:57.340
So tell me exactly what Barter Pay does, because I find this fascinating.
00:05:04.380
So we're trading and horse dealing on things all the time out here in the country.
00:05:14.540
But I think it's really interesting that you brought this to sort of the e-space, which
00:05:21.720
We're very grateful for this opportunity to serve businesses in this way and soon to be
00:05:27.240
But at the end of the day, Barter Pay, what we are as a company now that helps hundreds,
00:05:33.200
sorry, thousands of Canadian businesses, all Canadian businesses that want to participate,
00:05:36.820
get the things that they need without having to use their hard-earned cash.
00:05:40.720
And so, yeah, we do that across the country and in multiple different cities.
00:05:44.140
But we all know that, you know, like you've already mentioned, bartering is really the oldest
00:05:47.920
It's how business was invented a long time ago.
00:05:50.620
And so, but we also know that for two parties to enter into a fair trade, each side has to
00:05:55.120
want what the other person has at the same time and value, or they can't make that deal.
00:06:02.680
And so, yeah, to solve that problem, we've just created this platform that allows a business
00:06:09.800
They can establish an account number, then they can offer up their goods or services onto the
00:06:14.260
And we only really focus on what we call, you already alluded to this, their spare capacity,
00:06:20.920
For a service-based business, you know, that's time and space that's expiring.
00:06:25.240
For a product-based business, that's extra idle inventory sitting in the warehouse or on
00:06:29.040
the shelf that normally they'd have to discount.
00:06:31.880
And so, yeah, they offer up this spare capacity onto the network and they're able to bank barter
00:06:38.060
And one barter credit equals one Canadian dollar for valuation purposes.
00:06:41.040
And as they bank this new revenue stream of barter credits, they're able to then take
00:06:45.700
that barter value and go and barter and trade with anybody in the entire network.
00:06:50.300
They're not restricted to those that acquired their good or service.
00:06:52.800
So instead of this one-to-one conundrum of bartering, it's now this one-to-many ecosystem,
00:06:57.500
this sharing economy, this bartering network that allows all these businesses to monetize their
00:07:02.600
spare capacity in real time and all get what they need through the barter credit system.
00:07:07.260
So how many businesses are actively using this?
00:07:11.400
I think it's, as I said before, I think it's just fascinating that you figured out this way
00:07:15.540
to connect people with, you know, things that they have, but they can't use with people who
00:07:20.820
want it and have this other thing that they can't use.
00:07:26.200
And I'd love to chat about a couple of examples.
00:07:29.660
But just to answer your question, like we have about just over 4,000 businesses in about
00:07:35.500
Um, it's a very painstaking process to grow a parallel economy, especially a bartering
00:07:41.200
system that's dealing in a new form of, you know, digital medium of exchange, right?
00:07:44.980
So, uh, which is the barter credits themselves.
00:07:47.000
If you can picture 20, 25 years ago, I was 20 years old and I was, um, you know, starting
00:07:52.280
this barter system and I would, I would, you know, go through the yellow pages to try and
00:07:58.000
And, um, one of them was an office furniture place.
00:08:00.200
And so we just found out that he had been, uh, uh, pulled, pulled out a bunch of, uh,
00:08:04.680
used furniture from McMaster university and put in a bunch of new stuff.
00:08:07.480
Anyways, long story short, I'm chatting with him.
00:08:09.540
Hey, can we barter some workstations for our new office?
00:08:15.960
And as I'm filling out the actual application to onboard him as the very first customer,
00:08:19.660
he's like, well, where can I use my barter credits?
00:08:22.080
Once I, once I gained them, I said, sorry, Terry, like you're the first guy, like you just
00:08:26.900
And so it's been, it's been very difficult to grow, but again, we just stuck with it
00:08:31.520
And, and, and, you know, uh, for such a time as this, we now realized 25 years later that
00:08:35.440
it's actually going to, going to become mainstream and really help a lot of businesses, uh, you
00:08:41.420
You know, when you and I were talking the other day before we, before I was so intrigued that
00:08:48.780
Um, you were telling me about how essential this is for people with perishables.
00:08:57.220
Uh, there's a number of examples there from both from the time and space side, you know,
00:09:00.940
service-based businesses and, and the, uh, the product-based businesses, you know, products
00:09:06.680
But for example, uh, we did a deal, uh, recently, uh, about a year ago with a greenhouse in Niagara
00:09:12.300
And, uh, we found out that they were going to be, um, putting in their compost pile about
00:09:19.560
They just had, you know, they were a pretty big operation.
00:09:21.400
They just had extra plants that they didn't sell.
00:09:23.560
Um, and they're used to kind of having that, uh, that dump pile kind of build every, at
00:09:31.060
We'll advertise out your, you know, these SKUs to our network, uh, we'll, we'll sell
00:09:35.380
off some of those plants into barter credits and then you can use the barter credits.
00:09:38.220
So anyways, uh, thank goodness it was about, it was about October, uh, and it was a warmer
00:09:44.000
Thank goodness, because we ended up selling off about $150,000 worth of plants.
00:09:49.780
He was able to use them for things like printing and marketing and web, web development.
00:09:53.700
And he even gave, uh, I think 50,000 or more to charity, uh, through our barter pay it forward
00:09:59.340
We also have a charitable arm in the whole thing.
00:10:01.620
So yeah, it's like a super cool story of what was going to be going into the compost pile
00:10:06.120
is now being, you know, is capturing that value and now being redistributed, uh, for his
00:10:12.440
Now tell me about that charitable part, because, um, I think that's an incredible thing too.
00:10:18.240
The, not only are you helping businesses connect with other businesses so that, you know, they
00:10:22.940
can utilize the things that normally that would just be a, a write-off, but you also are giving
00:10:30.740
We really want to be a community impact business in that way.
00:10:33.560
Uh, it's, it's one of our biggest why's it is our biggest why right now is it's helping
00:10:37.560
small businesses and helping the community as well.
00:10:39.820
So essentially we've got thousands of businesses that are on the platform and that's growing.
00:10:43.540
Uh, we're teaching them to, you know, barter that spare capacity, monetize it, capture that
00:10:47.500
value and use those barter credits to offset future cash expenditures, um, to boost their
00:10:53.620
But at the same time, we're saying, Hey, in order to be competitive in today's environment,
00:10:57.280
you really have to be connected to your community as well.
00:10:59.160
But we also know that these small businesses don't have much cash to give back.
00:11:03.120
Uh, and so we've just invented a new way for, for businesses to, to barter, but also to, uh,
00:11:08.440
So we established the barter pay it forward foundation, uh, Canadian registered charity.
00:11:12.900
And now we've got, uh, you know, thousands, hundreds of thousands of barter credits being
00:11:17.160
donated to our foundation from these businesses.
00:11:22.500
We give them a great, you know, pat on the back and a social media shout out.
00:11:26.540
But then we take these barter credits in our foundation and we distribute them to charities
00:11:30.020
across Canada in all the communities that we're in.
00:11:32.400
And then those charities, this is the best part, take those same barter credits and spend
00:11:36.360
them right back into the same ecosystem from where they were generated to begin with.
00:11:40.340
So again, it's this closed loop, uh, exchange of value.
00:11:43.740
We're now we're looping in all these charities to, uh, offset their admin and overhead costs.
00:11:47.960
Like they need, you know, video production, website production, uh, swag, um, you know, printing
00:11:53.300
costs, um, you know, all sorts of things that they need for their, for their chair to run
00:11:57.160
And we want to help them reduce those admin and overhead costs so that more of the precious
00:12:00.980
donor cash can go to the end cause instead of administration.
00:12:04.220
So yeah, it's, it's such a great, um, feeling for us and our team loves it.
00:12:08.540
It's, it's, it's why we come into the work, come into work and do the work that we do.
00:12:13.400
I think that's what it's, it's great because I think at the end of the day, the charities
00:12:17.860
probably those barter credits go a little bit further than cash would if you were out spending
00:12:22.940
cash in the real world because of the ability to sort of negotiate what they want for what,
00:12:29.960
you know, for the costs that they're willing to pay.
00:12:31.700
But what's the point of entry for a business that wants to get involved in this system?
00:12:37.980
Because I think it might be a little overwhelming.
00:12:40.900
So what's the point of entry and how, is it easy?
00:12:45.440
I'm a little scared, but I'm also, I'm also scared of crypto.
00:12:50.940
So we're really big on making sure there's a, there's the right fit.
00:12:53.620
And so our process for onboarding, um, you know, new businesses into the platform, you
00:12:57.500
know, we're actually building out an app that will help, you know, this onboarding process
00:13:00.860
and sort of teaching and training and make it more self-serve.
00:13:03.560
But, uh, in the meantime, we're at our, our process is working.
00:13:06.460
What we do is we, we go to our website, barterpay.ca.
00:13:09.980
And from there you can, you know, scan the website, get started, you know, watch a few videos
00:13:14.900
That's all that's going to do is book you into a, into a quick 15 minute discovery call with one
00:13:19.040
of our business development people, mainly Cody and Cody will spend 15 minutes just kind
00:13:24.800
He will, um, you know, assess whether or not there's a fit, make sure that you actually
00:13:28.120
have spare capacity, whether it's time and space or extra inventory.
00:13:31.260
Cause that's the, uh, you know, the, that's the, that's the best way to kind of enter the
00:13:34.860
And it's all about just banking some barter credits and then utilizing some barter credits.
00:13:40.000
There's no minimums, you know, there's no nothing like that.
00:13:46.500
Uh, we part ways, you know, knowing a bit more about each other's business.
00:13:49.100
And if we, if we don't feel there's a fit for your business right now, or for the, for
00:13:52.360
the, for the prospect business, we'll just say, Hey, you know what?
00:13:55.660
We don't have a need for this in the network or whatever the case may be.
00:13:58.220
We're also, um, you know, as much as we have a technology that sort of manages all the
00:14:02.260
transactions, we actually, uh, really pride ourselves in being a human to human connection,
00:14:06.460
uh, in terms of our relationship with our clients.
00:14:08.820
And so every business that comes into the platform, we assign them a real life barter
00:14:13.000
coach, a real life person, uh, that manages, uh, about a 200 to 300, uh, client portfolio.
00:14:18.400
And that coach is an extension of their team, both from helping them market that spare capacity
00:14:23.400
out to the network so they can earn barter credits and capture that value.
00:14:27.320
But also maybe more importantly on the spending side, on the utilization side where they're
00:14:31.380
like, Hey, here's my wishlist of what I'm looking for.
00:14:34.160
You know, can you kind of put together some deals and find me some vendors that I can use
00:14:36.960
barter credits with instead of having to touch my cash.
00:14:39.620
And so that's, uh, that's a really great feature for the barter pay B2B side is the,
00:14:46.780
If you're a small business owner and you've tried to actually talk to a human being at the
00:14:52.100
So to provide business coaching, just, you know, as part of getting involved in the system,
00:14:57.900
I think that's a great value to a lot of businesses, but you've expanded this barter
00:15:03.440
system to normal people out there who maybe have, you know, again, I say stranded assets
00:15:11.460
or they want to barter the old fashioned way, person to person, the way it was in the villages
00:15:17.320
for millennia before the big banks and the government got involved.
00:15:22.120
Yeah, so we've been approached, uh, numerous times over the last, uh, five to 10 years
00:15:26.940
about how we can extend this kind of like the charities we're approaching us to make
00:15:30.240
it, you know, part of the charitable sector, uh, people have been asking, you know, how,
00:15:34.620
And we've kind of, you know, um, we're just busy building the B2B side and the charitable
00:15:38.580
So we really didn't have time, but over the last couple of years, obviously with, with, um,
00:15:42.280
where things are at, uh, you know, it's become even more prominent and prevalent.
00:15:45.880
So, uh, my wife and I, you know, thought about it and we're like, Hey, six months
00:15:49.120
ago, well, four to six months ago, we decided to, um, build a brand and, and we launched
00:15:59.220
It is the name of the person to person barter system that we're developing.
00:16:08.020
Everybody wants to, um, you know, be part of a big part of a new way to transact, you
00:16:13.480
And everybody's got, but the people also get back to the coincidence of wants, you know, they
00:16:17.940
have things that they want to offer, but it doesn't necessarily line up with what they
00:16:23.120
So we have to create a way, uh, that these people can actually barter and trade their
00:16:28.080
skills, their time, their expertise, their products, their, their downsizing their home,
00:16:35.160
And they, there's gotta be a way that they can, they can do that on an organized, uh, in
00:16:39.520
And that's where the barter it, um, app that we're launching in the next six months or so is
00:16:44.600
I think it's incredible because there are so many people out there who are, you know,
00:16:49.420
suffering pandemic job loss, but they are skilled or maybe they are liquidating their
00:16:57.240
And so they have, again, all these assets, they need to connect to somebody somewhere
00:17:02.480
And there are a lot of people who just want to check out of the inflationary system and
00:17:09.080
And you're giving them this opportunity now, what's the cost to entry for people who want
00:17:15.680
to get involved in this system once it's fully built out?
00:17:20.300
So once we're not going to be charging, like on our, on our B2B side, we charge a commission,
00:17:24.820
like a deferred sales commission for every transaction that we set up.
00:17:27.220
Cause we do a lot of work for those businesses, uh, for the people side, it's going to be very
00:17:31.720
Uh, we're all about providing them the tools and the ability to barter and whether they
00:17:36.040
use, you know, uh, the, the digital medium of exchange in that system is going to be
00:17:40.200
called bits, you know, one bit equals one Canadian dollar for valuation purposes, whether
00:17:44.440
they choose to barter directly because they got lucky, or they just want to give something
00:17:48.260
away for free or have a coffee with somebody because they met them through the barter at
00:17:51.460
community app, or they want to exchange within bits.
00:17:55.480
The fact is it's just going to be a small subscription fee is likely the way we're going to go, uh,
00:17:59.800
with that in terms of a revenue model so that we can continue to build it out and provide
00:18:04.360
Think Facebook marketplace and Kijiji, but only in a, in a, in a bartering economy, uh, with
00:18:11.480
So that's, that's kind of what's going to happen there.
00:18:13.460
You know, I really think that this addresses a real concern for a lot of Canadians who are
00:18:17.460
worried about the imposition of social credit into our financial systems.
00:18:25.360
You don't have to, but there are a lot of people who are feeling the real threat.
00:18:29.800
Of their personal, political, peacefully held opinions, disconnecting them from their bank
00:18:38.460
And I think for a lot of people, they're going to see what barter it offers and say, you know,
00:18:44.460
at least there, at least there, I can still exchange what I have with somebody else who
00:18:51.320
wants it without my bank account being frozen because I gave five bucks worth of coffee to
00:19:01.640
I mean, it's, uh, again, bartering is the oldest form of commerce.
00:19:06.880
Um, it's, it's, you know, these direct trades are always going to happen.
00:19:10.280
All we're doing is making it easier for people to connect in this, uh, system, in this community,
00:19:15.920
and then have this, you know, digital medium of exchange with the bits to be able to solve
00:19:21.400
And so that people can, um, can offer what they have, get those, those bits and then go
00:19:26.300
And everybody's working together in this, in this sharing economy.
00:19:30.760
Um, now what is the timeline for development of this?
00:19:35.300
Because I know you're, you're sometimes, I don't know about you, but it feels like I'm
00:19:44.760
And so you've already got barter pay up and running.
00:19:47.500
And so you've got to manage that, but what's the timeline for the build out for barter it?
00:19:52.780
So we spent a lot of time last year, uh, designing, uh, with UX UI, uh, all the screens for our
00:19:58.600
barter pay sort of, uh, app that we're going to be building out.
00:20:01.200
And that, that really is, can be transferable over to the barter it side.
00:20:04.340
So we've got a bit of a headstart on that in that aspect, but really we're in this bit
00:20:08.120
of a chicken and egg right now, no pun intended.
00:20:09.940
In fact, our technology company is called chicken and egg technology corp.
00:20:13.280
But, uh, but yeah, we're, we're, we've got, we've been approached by a lot of people in
00:20:17.260
the last month who've been hearing about, uh, barter pay and barter it, especially the
00:20:23.600
It's bigger than my team of 30 people with 150 years experience in this space.
00:20:30.060
And so we've had people making some donations just out of the blue, which is amazing.
00:20:33.760
We really thank them for that, but we're going to, we're going to open this up.
00:20:36.660
We've got people that want to invest, but the, you know, and these, the ROI
00:20:39.720
for the investors is, you know, it's more than financial gain.
00:20:42.560
It's all about, uh, they're helping build a new way of doing business, a new way of
00:20:47.280
transacting, a new way of connecting people like you've already alluded to.
00:20:52.420
And so we're, we're just deciding what we're going to do there.
00:20:55.240
Um, uh, we've got, um, uh, a lawyer, uh, in Calgary, a great lady who's, uh, working
00:20:59.920
on our shareholders agreement and some things there.
00:21:01.660
So it's, it's really just a matter of mapping that out.
00:21:03.560
We've got a call this afternoon with a, with a, an equity crowdfunding company out of BC.
00:21:07.800
And so we might go that route and allow everybody to participate that wants to sort of be
00:21:11.980
involved and which is, you know, would be amazing.
00:21:14.460
Um, so yeah, we're about to, uh, you know, I, I think, I think it's going to be about
00:21:18.280
a six month, uh, process from the time we actually get the funding that we need.
00:21:21.960
And then we can really sprint to the finish line and deliver the solution.
00:21:25.040
Uh, hopefully, you know, late spring of 2023 kind of thing.
00:21:31.780
If people want to throw some money because they're moral investors and they, they see this
00:21:37.660
sort of disconnecting from the existing financial system as a moral move, or if they're,
00:21:43.000
you know, just money motivated folks and I'm a capitalist, so I get that too.
00:21:47.600
So how do people get involved at this stage, um, in Barter It?
00:21:52.860
So the best thing to do right now is to go to the barterit.ca website, uh, www.barterit.ca.
00:22:03.320
You fill that form out so that we know we're connected.
00:22:05.860
Uh, we're then going to do all the, uh, the updates via email to that group.
00:22:10.080
There's thousands of people who are signing up and obviously there'll be much more,
00:22:12.740
um, as we, you know, um, make the story, uh, known.
00:22:16.460
And so it's, uh, yeah, we're excited about that.
00:22:18.440
So that's, that's step one is get on that list.
00:22:20.240
And then from there, as we, as we map out this plan and have a concrete way to, to move
00:22:25.100
forward in terms of the investment side, then we will, um, do that through that email campaign,
00:22:31.080
And then from there, we'll just, uh, find the right partners and move forward.
00:22:34.400
But, uh, actually if somebody wants to make a, you know, a donation, even in the short
00:22:37.900
term, uh, just down below on the screen, there's going to be an e-transfer email that you can
00:22:44.080
So we'd be happy to take a donation, obviously, but, uh, yeah, just whatever support, uh, that
00:22:49.560
We're really, really grateful for an honor to be, to be able to serve in this way.
00:22:53.620
And I think it's wonderful because part of the rebel ethos is to do things differently
00:22:58.560
and build some success doing things as a response to the failed old ways of doing things.
00:23:06.920
And, uh, you know, you're sort of that, but also backwards.
00:23:12.360
So you're doing something new with the economy and with transactions, but your new thing is
00:23:22.320
And I, I really appreciate that you're bringing this solution to normal people at a very low
00:23:29.180
cost to entry, because there are a lot of people struggling out there.
00:23:33.260
And I think this will help connect those people to other people who can sort of get their cash
00:23:44.960
And I really appreciate you taking the time to have me on here and, uh, look forward to
00:23:48.480
connecting with, with the audience and making sure that we, uh, we stay in touch.
00:23:55.200
I, uh, as things move along, I hope to have you back on the show because I'm very interested
00:24:01.120
I think it's going to be exceptional, quite frankly, John, thanks so much for coming on
00:24:13.260
Well, friends, we've come to the portion of the show where I take your viewer feedback.
00:24:17.080
If you'd like to send me viewer feedback, it's really easy.
00:24:19.720
First of all, leave a comment on one of our videos, wherever you might find it, either
00:24:25.200
on YouTube, but YouTube is a censorship platform.
00:24:28.360
So if you're watching us on rumble, leave a comment there.
00:24:32.360
Or if you want to send me an email directly, send it to Sheila at rebel news.com, put gun
00:24:39.540
So it's really easy for me to find because, wow, I'm sure you realize I probably get, you
00:24:45.360
know, a couple hundred emails a day and they're hard to sift through, but if you make it easy
00:24:49.240
for me to search, it'll be easy for me to read on air.
00:24:52.500
We care about what you think about the work that we're doing.
00:24:55.220
Unlike the mainstream media, they just take your money and they want you to shut up and
00:25:04.840
And today's comments are from the YouTube comment section on my interview with Tom Harris from
00:25:12.260
the International Climate Science Coalition from last week, where Tom discussed how citizens
00:25:19.180
of Ottawa are turning up at municipal debates and absolutely hammering the local politicians
00:25:26.360
on the issue of climate change and not so much the issue of climate change, although there
00:25:31.280
are some that are questioning the science for sure.
00:25:33.600
And science should always be questioned, but they are holding these politicians to account
00:25:41.440
If they support a multi-billion dollar climate plan that will cost, by Tom's analysis, I think
00:25:50.040
it's $60,000 per citizen of Ottawa, including the babies.
00:25:56.360
Somebody should have some answers for these people when they turn up at the municipal debates.
00:26:00.440
They should have some very good answers before they stick you with a bill that is akin to
00:26:08.960
You know, if you want an electric car, I wouldn't advise when they don't really work in Ottawa
00:26:13.420
Anyways, Cindy White Elliott writes and says, I appreciate how you cut through the narratives
00:26:19.420
to expose the facts and the relevance of an issue.
00:26:22.000
The experts like Tom Harris always support the truth and facts as we know them to be.
00:26:33.820
He wants to have a civil discussion on the facts.
00:26:39.560
Take the emotions out of it and let's talk about the facts, the science, the cost.
00:26:45.600
The problem is the other side wants to inject emotion into everything.
00:26:50.760
They want to listen to a little Swedish girl who's mad at all the grown-ups and insists that
00:26:59.300
And people like Tom and like our friend Michelle Sterling at Friends of Science, they say, no,
00:27:04.160
let's have the grown-ups come into a room and we're going to talk about what we're doing,
00:27:09.800
what we can do, if any of it is effective, if we even care if it's effective.
00:27:14.660
And for me, what does this cost my family at the end of the day?
00:27:18.160
For me, that's my big concern because I want to weigh the risks versus benefits.
00:27:23.140
And if handing me a $60,000 bill plus my kids a $60,000 bill for literally nothing in return,
00:27:33.000
I don't think that's a good risk versus reward.
00:27:40.060
Carport Carl says, yes, environmentalists, the climate does change.
00:28:04.460
We're just another variable in the grand scheme of things.
00:28:09.000
What I disagree with is the extent to which the left environmentalists say that I've changed
00:28:20.220
You know, they keep telling me that it's going to get warmer.
00:28:22.080
And I keep saying, quit threatening me with a good time.
00:28:24.800
But what I really reject here is the idea that people who live their lives inside of a cubicle
00:28:31.260
and call a 600 square foot high rise personal coffin their home and who ride their bike everywhere
00:28:44.200
I reject the presupposition that those people care more about the environment than me.
00:28:52.700
My livelihood depends on the health of the environment around me.
00:28:59.540
To write me off to say that I don't care about the environment because I think differently about my relationship with it is stupid and ridiculous.
00:29:11.000
I spend more time in nature than the people who live in cities telling me that I don't care about it.
00:29:19.260
I really, I don't care about their cubicle criticism.
00:29:26.540
Thanks to everybody in the office in Toronto and around the country who works hard to put the show together for you.
00:29:32.880
I'll see everybody back here in the same time, in the same place next week.
00:29:35.980
And remember, don't let the government tell you that you've had too much to think.